On Fanon's Manichean Delirium

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    O N

    FANON S MANICHEAN

    DELIRIUM

    by lv ar o Reyes

    ntroduction

    F

    OR

    M NY

    readers, entering Fanon's first chap-

    ter

    of

    The

    Wretched

    of

    the Earthcan be a bit

    dis-

    concerting,

    not

    only

    for the

    positions expounded

    there concerning violence,

    but

    also

    for

    what

    ap-

    pearsas animplicit affirmation of thevery Ma n-

    icheanism that accordingto Fanon subtendsthe

    colonial order. Thatis,when Fanon states thatthe

    colonial worldis aworld dividedintwo, it is in

    no way

    a

    simple denunciation,

    but in

    his eyes,

    the

    objective delineation of tbeparameters of pos-

    sibility within the existing colonial situation.As

    Fanon reads

    the

    scope

    and

    direction

    of the

    initial

    movements

    of the

    colonized,

    he

    concludes that

    their actions do no t reinforce, no r seek to replicate,

    this initial situation. Rather,theentire truth of

    the Wretched's movementis to actually split

    the world in two and create a rupture from

    the entirety of this situation that will allowthe

    Wretched

    to

    destroy both

    the

    colonizer

    and

    figu-

    ratively, themselves as colonized. This wouldbe to

    turn away from thephysical violenceof theanti-

    colonial war in

    a

    strict sense, and toward the inno -

    vation required

    to

    bring

    a

    new subject

    of

    political

    action into existence. As Fanon repeats again

    and

    again (despite many sub sequent m isreadings to the

    contrary),thesuccessorfailureof theWretched

    depends on their capacity to achieve what untu

    thenhadrema ined, strictly speaking, impossible.

    mbivalence

    ambivalences

    of

    identification touch ed upon

    in Fanon's previous writings, most specifically

    with

    his

    invocation

    of

    Lacanian psychoanalysis

    and its mirror stage of the T to approximate

    the question of black psychopathology' in

    chaptersix of

    Black

    Skin

    White

    Masks.ForHomi

    Bhabha,it is certainlyin the opening pagesof

    Wretched soenmeshedin theanticolonial struggle

    of revolutionary Algeria, where Fanon is forced

    to impede

    the

    exploration

    of

    the...ambivalent,

    uncertain questions

    of

    colonial desire.

    The

    state

    of

    emergency from which

    he

    [Fanon]

    writes demands more insurgent answers, more

    immediate identifications. ^

    In other words, Fanon's affirmation of an

    inversionofcolonial Manicheanism in Wretched

    has been interpretedas akindof deviation from

    Black Skin White Masks.^Although one could

    derive such

    an

    argument from Fanon's writings,

    the above approach treats Fanon's method

    of

    describing

    the

    unfolding

    of the

    various m omen ts

    of the national revolutionary impulseas if these

    moments existed as independent ends.

    A sATOSekyi-Otu has pointed out,theadmo-

    .ZAJiition of what Bhabha calls Fanon's mo re

    imm ediate identification with the colonized

    in

    Wretched

    hinges on isolating the moment of

    reverse Manicheanism in Fanon from the

    larger unfolding of Fanon's own dialectical

    narrative of decolonization.* Such an approach

    treats

    the

    question

    of

    anti-racist racism

    and

    race

    war as if

    these were

    the

    final rather

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    dialectic of alterity to inte rrup t what it

    reads as Fanon's appropriations of a classically

    Hegelian inflected narrative of alienation and

    disalienation. In that narrative, the moment of

    enc oun ter implicit in colonization is the unfolding

    of a simple term in its becoming other, and the

    mo me nt of decolonization as the negation of

    the negation, ^ the return to itself as an achieved

    concept. H ere not only do we see reduced Fanon's

    own thoughts on Manicheanism, but we are also

    led to underestimate the achievements Fanon

    intuits when this Manicheanism is confronted

    and effectively crushed by the thought and action

    of the colonized.

    World Div ide d in Two

    N

    OT ONLY is Fan on's world divided in tw o

    devoid of social ambivalences between col-

    onizer and colonized, but Fanon goes so far as

    to claim that the distinction itself exists at the

    level of a difference in species, '' which he fur-

    the r describes as congenitally antag onistic due

    to the very reification sec reted and nurtured by

    the colonial situation. ' The language of species

    used by Fanon is chosen from the vocabulary of

    the colonists themselves, whose dehumanization

    of the colonized subject leads them to speak in

    zoological term s when referring, for instance,

    to the yellow multitudes. Th at

    is,

    for Fan on, the

    colonists do not tire of referring to the colonized

    in terms of ...ho rde s, ...stink, ...swarming , ...

    seedling...

    etc.

    In addition, these zoological categories are

    assigned a hierarchy of value; the animalistic

    colonized is incapable of holding human values

    and sthus considered the quintessence of evil. ^

    These differentiations, stemming from a reduc-

    tion to the biological, then lead the colonists to

    the necessity of p rotectin g the ruling species from

    infection em ana ting from the natives.' Th is is

    a protection that only arrives by the application

    of the Aristotelian logic of mu tual exclusion ex-

    pressed in the strict spatial compartmentalization

    of the colony into European and Native quarters

    (of which South African apartheid was paradig-

    matic but not exceptional for Fan on). Th at is,

    the heart of the colonists' project can be delineat-

    ed through the geographical configuration and

    classification

    [s]

    which it then circularly employs

    The colonists' sector is a sector built to last, all stone

    and steel. It's a sector of lights and pav ed road s, where

    the trashcans constantly overflow with strange and

    wonderful garbage, undreamed-of leftovers. The col-

    onists' feet... are protected by solid shoes in a sector

    where the streets are clean and smooth, without a pot-

    hole,

    without a stone.. .The colonist's sector is a white

    folks'

    sector, a sector of foreigners.'^

    This sector could not stand in sharper distinc-

    tion to the natives' quarters:

    The native quarters, the shantytown, the Med ina,

    the reservation, is a disreputable place inhabited by

    disreputable people. You are born anywhere, anyhow.

    You die anywhere, from anything. It's a world with

    no space, people are piled one top of the other, the

    shacks squeezed tightly together. The colonized sector

    is a famished sector, hungry for bread, meat, shoes,

    coal, and Ught... It is a sector of niggers, a sector of

    towelheads.

    Accordingly, in the colony there exists a near

    confiuence between geographical location, spe-

    cies/race, and social standing. That is, one's so-

    cial position within colonial society is directly

    correlated to which of these species, which of

    these races, one belongs, which in tur n deter-

    mines what physical location one inhabits in the

    colony.'* A certain circularity should be noted

    here between the classificatory schmas of the

    zoological terms and the physical manifestation

    of apartheid. That is, there is a relay between the

    creation of the colonized as an epistemologically

    know able object and the spatial segregation, o

    locational fixing of that object within the colo-

    ny. Th e circularity of this bio-geo graphic d eter-

    minism is cap tured nicely by Charles Mills, who

    explains, you are what you are in part because

    you originate from a certain kind of space, and

    that space has those properties in part because it

    is inhabited by creatures likeyourself. ''

    I

    T BECOMES clear then from these descriptions

    that the colonial project is the production of

    a Ma nichean world. In order to keep these

    worlds apart, domination cannot be hidden; the

    zone of the colonist and that of the native face

    each other separated by napalm and rifle butts,

    direcy opposed but never in the service of a

    higher unity.' ^ That is, for Fanon, the colonial

    world stands in immediate contradistinction to

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    referto it.'' TheM aniche an reality providesthe

    material from which the colonized draws

    to

    move

    from fixedness to action, evenif this minimal

    dem an d is still firmlyin thegripsof reaction.

    On Violence

    H

    AVING BROKEN with fatalism and identified

    the colonist

    as the

    externalizable cause

    of oppression, thenativeisalso ableto identify

    the mechanism through which that oppression

    is made

    a

    realityviolence. That

    is, as

    Fanon

    states,it is the settler's unmediated violence that

    has shownthenative onceand for allthat colo-

    nialismis not a machine capableof thinking,a

    body endowed with reason.It is naked violence

    and only gives

    in

    when confronted with greater

    violence. '^Itis the violenceofthe colonizer that

    has created the colonized; it

    is

    through their bay-

    onets and cann on fire that they have destroyed

    the ve ry the social fabricofnative Hfe, e.g., econ-

    omy, lifestyle, and modes of dress.^' Thus it is

    through this violence that the colonist not only

    imposes a separation of the speciesbut in fact

    fabricates itsother,thecolonized.If thecolo-

    nistscansay tha tthenativesareanimals,itisbe-

    cause their violencehasdone everything possible

    to reduce themto ananimal-ke existence (all the

    more vicious,for never having succeeded).Yet,

    according to Fanon, duetothe lawof reciprocal

    hom ogeneity that characterizes theM anichean

    realityofthe colonial situation, this violence em a-

    nating from the colonist shows the native the pa th

    that he m ust taketofreedom ... colonialism only

    loosens its hold when the knifeis atits throat. ^*

    Directly following

    in

    this line

    of

    Manichean

    inversion. Fanon states that

    the

    colonized

    man

    finds his freedom in and through violence. ^'^If

    the Manicheanism of the colonial situationhas

    provided

    an end

    goal

    for the

    nativethe expul-

    sionof thecolonizerthen thedaily imposition

    of colonialism through visible violence has in-

    dicated

    the

    means

    by

    which this goal might

    be

    achieved. That is, it is thedirectandorganized

    violenceof a unified people that diminishesthe

    capacity

    of

    the m etropolis to act, forcing the colo-

    nizer eventually to abandon the colony.'^ We here

    to move beyond

    the

    initial min imal dem and

    beyond reaction, that the colonized can move

    beyond violenceandtowardaproperly activeac

    tion.

    Manicheanism Partisan Struggle

    and Strategy:

    Splitting the World in Two

    S

    EEING TH Tthe questionofviolence isinfact

    subset of the larger issueof Manicheanism

    what

    are

    we

    to

    make

    of

    Fanon's insistence

    on th

    forceof the colonized's Manichean inversionof

    the colonial situation? That is, should weview

    Fanon's sympathy for this inversion, as Bhabha

    has done,as an oversimplified identification with

    the plight

    of

    the colonized induced by the exigen

    ciesof ananticolonial war?ForFanon, although

    this inversionwasabsolutely necessary to break

    fromthestructureofcolonialism,as he iscarefu

    to pointout, it is in no waysufficient for a suc

    cessful process

    of

    decolonization.

    It is

    importan

    to rememberthereasonfor thenecessityof thi

    inversion. Thefirst reasonis that throughthe

    Manichean inversion, thecolonized are ableto

    see that colonialismdid notariseout ofontolog

    ical necessity

    but

    rather through

    the

    contingen

    historical actionsof the colonizer. That is,colo

    nizationis ahistorical phenomenoninwhichth

    privileged agentsare thecolonists. A lthoughth

    existenceof this phenomenon limitstheconduc

    of

    the

    colonized,

    the

    realization

    of its

    historicity

    simultaneously reopensthefieldofhistoryto th

    possibilityoftheir own agency.

    Second,

    and

    perhaps more importantiy,

    th

    rediscovery of historical possibility is accompa

    nied by the acknowledgment that ontological

    and

    historical justificationsof colonization serve only

    to obscure theissueof force, and thereforeth

    realization that the violent imposition of colo

    nialismcan beansweredinthe violent actionso

    the colonized. In this turn of events, successo

    failure doesnot liesimplyin a tactical defeato

    the colonizerbut inthe enorm ous strategic victo

    ry achieved

    in

    exposing the absolute exhau stion

    of politics unde rthecolonial structure.^ Itisa

    this poin t

    of

    exhaustion that, according to Fanon

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    By viewing both colonization and decoloni-

    zation as simply a question of relative stren gth

    and thus of o pen struggle, the colonized have giv-

    en up on government inquiries and searches

    for justi ce within the colonial context.' ' Th us

    the logic of exclusion that maintains the colonial

    structure resurfaces as a point of excess over and

    above this structure from which the colonized can

    be clear tha t the only legitimacy sustaining the co-

    lonial regime is tha t of force.*' Restructu ring the

    world is possible.

    A

    s

    F ANON

    notes (as early as Black Skin,

    White

    Masks ,

    this realization is worldw ide,

    and subjects throughout the Third World were

    sh attering their chains with the example of the

    Vietnamese at Dien Bien Phu to emulate. That

    is,

    through the organization of force, and more

    specifically the cond uct of guerilla wa r (what

    F anon refers to as tha t instrum ent of violence of

    the colonized ), a Dien Bien Phu was now with-

    in reach of every colonized subject.*^ The Man-

    ichean inversion allows the colonized to see that

    colonization is a question of the organization of

    force, and that that kind of organization, through

    guerilla warfare, is imminently within reach.

    Th rou gh this analysis of the exhaustion of

    politics, F anon is firmly within the formation

    of the Third World partisan. This was a figure

    developed independently and in particular plac-

    es and instances, but which was formed within

    the overall situation of colonialism and came

    to conclusions strikingly similar to those set out

    by Mao Zedong, whom Carl Schmitt called the

    new C lausew itz (or as we might say today, an

    inverted C lausewitz), com paring him to the nine-

    teenth-century Cerman military theorist who

    famously declared: war is the contin uation of

    politics by other me ans. M ao writes:

    War is the continua tion of p olitics. In this sense

    wa r is politics and wa r itself is a political action; since

    ancient times there has not been a war that did not

    have a political character... When politics develops

    to a certain stage beyond which it cannot proceed by

    tlie usual means, war breaks out to sweep away those

    obstacles in the way.. .It can therefore be said that pol-

    itics is war withou t bloodshed while war is politics with

    bloodshed.

    This conclusion not only produces a challenge

    tion to those would-be or semi- sympathizers who

    mistakenly reduce the possible agency of the colo-

    nized to a compromise or action within the colonial

    stmcture. Fanon righdy notes that these objections

    to the organization of force and to the unleashing

    of violence repeated a certain developmentalist

    logic tha t makes the colonized losers from the sta rt.

    To dem onstrate this oft-repeated logic. F anon cites

    a passage from Friedrich Engels'

    Anti Durhing

    that

    is worth reproduc ing in its entirety:

    Just as Crusoe could proc ure a sword forhimself we

    are equally entitled to assume that one fine m ornin g

    Friday might appear with a loaded revolver in his

    han d, and then the whole force relationship is

    inverted. Friday commands and it is Crusoe who

    has to drudge . . .

    So,

    then, the revolver triumphs over

    the sword; and this will probably make even the

    most childish axiomatician comprehend that force

    is no m ere a ct of will, but requires very preliminary

    conditions before it can com e into opera tion, that is

    to say, instruments, the more perfect of which van-

    quish the less perfect; moreover, that these instru-

    ments have to be produced, which also implies that

    the producer of more perfect instruments of force,

    vulgo

    arms, vanquishes the producer of the less per-

    fect instrument, and that, iti a word, the triumph

    of force is based on the production of arms, and

    this in turn on production in generaltherefore on

    econo mic power, on the econom ic order, on

    the material means which force has at its disposal.**

    W

    ITHIN Engels' tex t. F anon saw the

    construction of an argument that attempts

    to bury confiict within the discourse of economic

    development, nullifying the question of political

    Wl and thus seemingly freezing tlie relations of

    force throughout timefatalism, resignation

    and apathy. Given the pervasiveness of this

    logic, even within the nationalist parties in the

    colonies in which the anticolonial struggle had

    been defeated before it was even initiated, it is

    impo rtant to highlight F anon's understanding that

    the formation of the consciousness of species/

    race struggle brought on by the inversion of

    colonial Manicheanism ran directiy counter to the

    logic exemplified by Engels' text. That is, to use

    the terminology developed by Michel Foucault

    while analyzing a strikingly parallel situation, what

    Fanon is describing is a paradigmatic case of the

    formation of the historical/political discourse of

    the partisan, which faces off against the juridical/

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    Reversibility Another Politics

    A

    CCORDING

    to

    Foucault, juridical-philosophic

    discourse

    is the

    discourse

    of

    sovereignty,

    which begins with three pre-given concepts:

    law,

    the unity

    of

    power,

    and the

    subject.*^ By starting

    with the individual (thesubject) aspre-given,

    sovereignty is able to present subjection as the

    necessary given in any relationship of power.*'

    It

    is

    worth noting how strong the connection

    be-

    tween

    the

    production

    of the

    individual

    and the

    structure

    of

    subjection is

    for

    Fanon as well. As

    he

    states, first among

    the

    values that

    the

    colonist

    tries

    to

    inculcate into the native intellectual is that

    of individualism:

    The colonialist bourgeoisie hammered into the

    colonized mindthenotionof asocietyof individuals

    where eachislockedin his subjectivity, where wealth

    lies

    in

    thought.

    But the

    colonized intellectual

    who is

    lucky enough

    to

    bunker down with the people during

    the liberation struggles, will soon discover

    the

    falsity

    of this theory. Involvement in the organization of

    struggle will already introduce him to a different

    vocabtdary. Brother, sister, com rad e.

    Thu s, in sharp contrast

    to

    sovereign discou rse,

    historical/political discourse begins with the

    sit-

    uation

    of

    domination, with

    the

    establishment

    of

    sovereignty throughthedefeatof oneportionof

    society by another. Therefore, and much as Fanon

    himself sees,itis the colonist who fabricated and

    continuestofabricate the colonized subject, the

    historical/political discourse

    of the

    partisan sees

    the individual

    and his or her

    subjection

    not as a

    necessary pre-given but as ma nufac tured within

    the relations

    of

    power (Fanon 2004, 2).

    To

    quote

    Foucault,

    the

    emphasis

    of

    historical/political

    dis-

    course

    is on

    how actual relations

    of

    subjugation

    man ufacture subjects (FoucaiJt

    2003,

    45). Im-

    portantly then, politicsforthe partisan (i.e.,asde -

    scribed by Fanon in the Third World movement as

    a whole)farexceedsthe political institutions of

    any given society which

    are in

    fact

    a

    subset

    of a

    relation

    of

    force wthin which the subjugated,

    the

    colonized,

    act

    along w ith

    the

    colonizer.

    The

    logic

    of the partisan, according to Foucault, is that pow -

    er does

    not

    emanate from

    the

    sovereign; rather,

    sovereignty itself is the expression

    of a

    given rela-

    tion of force that involves the entirety

    of a

    society.

    Asa consequence, thebinary or Manichean

    which subtends sovereignty, tha t subject which es-

    tablishes itself between the adversaries,inthe cen

    ter and above them, imposing one general law and

    foundingareconciliatory orde r whichisdirectl

    challenged by the partisan insistence tha t you mus

    belong to o ne side

    or

    another in this war.*'

    Perhaps

    in

    light

    of

    these insights we

    can

    mor

    fully explore

    the

    discussion

    of

    Fanon's apparen

    praise

    of the

    M anichea n logic

    of

    decolonization

    Within this context,theissueof violence canno

    simply be reduced to physical force; as Fano

    states, the occupier can easily phase out th

    violent aspectsofhis pres ence. It therefore migh

    more productively

    be

    seen

    as the

    mechanism

    through which anticolonial m ovements as a whole

    attempted

    to

    link the issue

    of

    strategy

    and

    tactic

    to political outcomes;

    a

    new relation

    of

    force.^

    This necessitates

    a

    logic which

    has the

    virtu

    of positing

    all

    relations

    of

    force, unlike

    the lo

    ic presented earlierbyEngelsand tbenational

    ist bourgeoisie parties,as purely contingentan

    thus immanently reversible(aninsight that toda

    seems somewhat obvious, keeping in mind tha

    such flippancy is only possible than ks

    to the

    ver

    process

    of

    decolonization in which Fanon is so in

    tensely immersed). Furthermore,

    if the

    colonia

    situation

    is in

    fact composed from

    top to

    bottom

    as

    a

    relation

    of

    force,

    or a

    war, that exceeds

    th

    institutions

    of

    what

    in the

    West has been terme

    the political (that space containedin theinter

    action be tween state and civil society), then in rec

    ognizing that war the colonized would haveto d

    far more than merely expel the colonizer. The

    would

    in

    fact have

    to

    produc e entirely new spac

    es

    for

    political action; their aim would thus hav

    to

    be to

    achieve

    the,

    until then, impossible,

    an

    change politics itself

    Beyo nd War Innova te

    I

    T IS EQU LLYimportant to note that, througho

    the first chapter of Wretched Fanon captu

    the virtue of the inverted Manicheanism o

    the colonized while never himself viewing tha

    Manicheanism

    as an end.

    Rather,

    as he

    state

    on

    a

    number

    of

    occasions, this demand

    ( th

    last shall become first )

    is

    simply

    the

    minima

    demand which

    he

    will later explain

    is

    relate

    to

    the

    expression

    of a

    vague form

    of a

    nationa

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    very little happens in the spaces of the colonizer

    or in those of the colonized. In fact. Fanon refers

    to this entire "reality," the entirety of the spaces

    in the given order of places of colonization, as

    the "zone of death." But within the space of the

    colonized, the establishment of an "anti-racist

    racism " is an initial action that like all first actions

    for Fanon is mere reaction, but nevertheless a re-

    action (the Man ichean inversion) that can be split

    within itself

    Fanon explains, this reaction, like aU reaction,

    is more likely than not to continue forever in the

    logic of "reciprocal homogeneity" and "hate"

    that characterizes the colonial situation. But the

    reaction that brings to light the "exhaustion of

    politics" vthin the colonial structure, far beyond

    the mere deployment of physical violence, leads

    to the collective realization that colonization/

    decolonization must be a question of "relative

    strength" between

    tw o

    distinct subjective forces.

    In this realization the colonized has stepped

    onto the scene to smash the self-satisfied fullness

    of the colonizer, not only reintroducing the

    possibility of a reversal of fortune, the possibility

    of moving from "persecuted to persecutor," but

    more importandy, the possibility of what Fanon

    would term "scission," a break from the colonial

    structure, the space for the existence of another

    subject altogether. In Fanon's words, they have

    introduced the possibility of turning away from

    Europe and affirming "the new." Therefore, for

    Fanon , the spaces of the colonized are themselves

    split in two between mere reaction, firmly within

    the "zone of turbulence," and what Fanon terms

    "the zone of action."

    HIS "zone of action" however can not by

    definition exist

    between

    colonizer and

    colonized, as Homi Bhabha would have it, as

    each of these figures and therefore everything

    betweenthem is stiU firmly in the "zone of dea th."

    Rather, the "zone of action" comes into being

    in the point of scission, the point of decision of

    the colonized to destroy themselves as colonized,

    and "the new," or as Fanon had previously put

    it, "the unforeseeable." In other words, the

    Wretched have caUed the bluff of the colonizer,

    and to the colonizers frequent exclamations, "you

    are not like us " they have set out, through an

    Wretched , to make this statement an unqualified

    truth, answering, "We wiU make ourselves far

    more different than you can imagine " They have

    set out to achieve the alteration of being, to bring

    into existence another element, in but not of, the

    colonial situationthemselves as an independent

    subjective force.

    TT^INALLY, we should be careful here, as the pro-

    X duction of an actual duality, the produc tion

    of th e Wretched as an active subjective element is

    irreconcilable w ith the first element (i.e. colonial-

    ism), with regard to the question of difference.

    The first element, Europe's Manichean dualism

    ("a world divided in two") is the mechanism for

    the production and reproduction of a purely

    monological discourse. In contrast, the struggle

    of the colonized to bring into existence an ac-

    tual duality (the Third World partisan's struggle

    described by Fanon as "Split[ting] the world in

    two") is the onto-historical condition of possibility

    for the end of that monologue, for difference. Far

    from the today fashionable declarations of "Long

    live difference " TheWretchedo fthe Earth remind

    us that difference today stands on the shoulders

    of millions of anticolonial militants.

    n notes

    1. Bha bha, Ho mi K., 77 Locatim of Culture (New York:

    Routledge, 1994)44.

    2.

    Bhabha, Homi K., "Remembering Fanon,"New Formations

    7,(1987): 118-124.

    3.Gibson, Nigel, "Fanon and the Pitfalls of Cultural Studies,"

    FrantzFanon:CriticalPerspectives, ed. Anthony C . Alessa

    ni (New York: Roudedge, 1999) 102.

    4. Sekyi-Otu, Ato,Fanon s Lkaiectic ofExperience (Cambridg

    Harvard University Press, 1996).

    5.

    Badiou, Alain, Theoryofthe Subject(New York: C ontinuum

    2009)3-12.

    6. Fanon, Frantz, Th eWretchedo fthe Earth(New York: Grov

    Press,

    2004) 1.

    7. Ibid., 2.

    8. Ibid., 7.

    9. Ibid., 6.

    10. Gibson, Nigel, Fanon: The Pastcoimial Ima^nao n

    (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2003) 108.

    11.

    Fanon,Wretched 3.

    12.Ibid., 4.

    13.Ibid.

    14.Ibid., 5.

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    16.Ibid,.

    4.

    17.

    Ibid.

    18. Ibid.,

    3.

    fBtack Skin,White Masks,

    is

    productively read

    alongside, and against, Hegel's Phmomenotogy o

    Spirit,

    I propose that these descriptionsof alackof asitefor

    mediational education within colonial society willbeseen

    to

    be

    formulated

    by

    Fanon more directly

    in

    relation

    to

    and against, Hegel'sEtementsofthe Philosophyof

    Right.

    n

    other words, what Fanon ismos t specifically referencing

    in theabove parag raph is thelack

    of

    existence

    of

    civil

    society within thecolony.SeeG.W.F. He gel,Etements of

    the Phitesophy ofRight (New York: Cambridge University

    Press, 1991)219-274.

    19.Ibid.,

    5.

    20 .Ibid.,4.

    21 . Ibid.

    22.Ibid.,

    17.

    23 .

    Ibid., 31.

    24 .Ibid.,16.

    25 .

    Ibid.

    26 .Ibid.,6.

    27 . Ibid.,

    10.

    28 .

    Ibid.,5 9.

    29 . Ibid.,16.

    30.

    Ibid.,

    10.

    [Fanon's phrase invokes Jesus's words in Matthew

    20:16: So the tost shatt be

    irst

    and theirstast:for many are

    catted but ew chosen (King Jam es Bible). Ed.]

    31.

    Fanon,

    Wretched

    50; and

    Sartre, Jean-Paul,Btack Orpheus

    (Cambridge: H arvard University Press, 1988) 296.

    32.Fanon,Wretched 23 .

    33.Ibid.,

    6.

    34.

    Ibid., 23.

    35.Ibid., 86.

    36.

    Ibid., 30.

    37.Ibid.,1.

    38.Gihson, Fanon:The PostcotoniatImaginaon, 119.

    39. Fanon,Wretched 83 .

    40 .Ibid., 61 .

    41 .Ibid.,42-43.

    42 .Ibid., 26 and 31 .

    43 .MaoZedongandKnight, Nick,M aoZedong on Diateccat

    Materiatism: Writings onPhilosophy 1937(Armonk:

    M.E.

    Sharpe, 1990) 135-136.

    44 . Friedrich Engelsasquoted in Fanon's 77;Wretchedofthe

    Earth,25 .

    45 .

    Foucault, Michel,SocietyMustBe Defended(New York:Pic-

    ador, 2003) 57.

    46 .Ibid., 44.

    47 .Ibid., 29, 30.

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